Last year in Germany five of seventeen reactors were shutdown at the same time: Biblis A + B, Gundremmingen C, Brunsbuettel and Kruemmel (together about 5.000 MW).
Nevertheless nobody in Germany had to sit in the dark nor there were any restrictions to the use of electricity.
The summer was quite average (also average precipitation => enough electrical energy, and there was no excess use of AC.
France which had problems with his nuclear plants in the hot and dry summer 2006 is the owner of all river power plants along the Rhine and the german-french border from Basel (Switzerland) till almost to Karlsruhe (Germany). Therefore the part of renewable energy in total is almost 10% in France.
Last year the installed (peak) capacity of all wind turbines in Germany were about 22.000 MW (
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power ).
And this was still the first place, but i'm quite sure that the USA this year will make itself the number one.
Alltogether they delivered more than 7% of the net demand of electrical energy consumption.
Last year 108 turbines were replaced with 45 new ones, eventhough the installed power went from 41 MW of the old ones to 103 MW (factor 2,5). The new ones represent only about 6% of all installed turbines
NeverthelessGermany has still important obstacles in delivering more electrical energy from its 22.000 wind turbines to the customers:
The biggest are called the big four energy companies (RWE, Vattenfall, EON and ENBW). They are regulating the transfer of power within their regime/reich. So it can happen by chance that there is too much power in one regime (e.g. caused by wind) and in a neighbouring regime there is too less power. But only God knows why then it is not possible to level the differences.
By the way: The big companies are also ruling (more or less) the so called power management in Germany.
If there is a lack of power in Germany, the companies can demand a higher price for each kilowatthour, no matter if the kilowatthour was produced for 4 Cents in an old nuclear plant or for 10-12 Cents in a gas powered plant which had to be started extra because of the lack.
Then there is the possibility to store power as heat or as cold in big plants (cold storage buildings, district heating) or also in small homes (freezer, refrigerator, heat pump, heat storage tank).
The technique therefore is alread invented and used since several decades (night storage heater = heated up (stones; up to 700°C) during the night with cheap current and giving the heat back during the day): The Kill switch or ripple control (controlled by radio signals). All the electrical installation to use this technique in every household is already installed in Germany since many years (an obligate standard for new houses) but nowadays almost nobody knows that (not even the installers; or is it a taboo?) , so it's only necessary to implement a little bit more electronic in freezers, refrigerators etc.
These storages could be used to avoid peak of electrical loads around midday (e.g. freezer are cooled down - one to two degrees more - half an hour or more before midday) and therefore leveling the demand.
In Germany it happened last year two times, that electrical power at the power stock exchange (EEX) in Leipzig, that power costed 0 (zero) Cents. There was unexpectedly too much power generated by the wind turbines, which happens very seldom because of the good weather predictions of at least one day) and it wasn't possible to shut down any more power plants in that short period of time.
Also last year or two years ago the price of an kilowatthour exceeded the allowance paid for owners of private PV-plants (then about 50 Cents per kWh).
With this it would be possible - at the same time - to raise the portion of renewable produced electricity, to lower the price of a kilowatthour (leveled load around midday), to unburden the net respectively to transfer more renewable produced power and to save or better replace fossil fuels.
I hope the answer is now sufficient?
